The Palestinian Media Watch monitors the official media of the Palestinian National Authority (P.A.). Recently it exposed the way they are rewriting history and the Bible.

In the May 6 edition of the P.A.’s official daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, columnist Adel Abd al-Rahman presented his version of the biblical narrative.

“Easter ... is not a holiday for Christian Palestinians only but a holiday for Palestinian nationalism because Jesus, may he rest in peace, is a Canaanite Palestinian. His resurrection, three days after being crucified and killed by the Jews -- as reported in the New Testament -- reflects the Palestinian narrative, which struggles against the descendants of modern Zionist Judaism, in its new colonialist form, that conspires with the Western capitalists who claim to belong to Christianity.

Jesus, may he rest in peace, the virtuous patriotic Palestinian forefather, who renewed the Old Testament, split away from its followers, brought forth his New Testament and spread it among mankind -- which led the Jews to persecute him until they caught him, crucified him and murdered him. Afterwards, he rose from the dead like the phoenix and set out to spread his teachings that still exist and will exist as long as mankind exists.

Jesus' story is his [Palestinian] people's story; the Zionist movement -- tool of the capitalist West -- wanted to falsify historical facts, to exile and crucify the Palestinian Arab nation and then murder it by means of ethnic cleansing... But the Palestinians, Jesus' descendants, rose from the ashes, like the phoenix, from the ruins of the Nakba [i.e., "the catastrophe," the Palestinian term for the establishment of the State of Israel] and the Naksa [i.e., "the setback," Palestinian term for Israel's victory in the Six Day War.] They dressed their wounds and raised the flag of nationality again by founding parties and factions...

Easter is a distinct [Palestinian] national holiday which doesn't concern only Christians but rather all Palestinians believing in the different religions- - Islam, Christianity and Judaism."

Many Christians would note the following:

· Jesus was born a Jew from "the house of David" in the town of Bethlehem in Judea, as foretold by the Jewish prophets. He's not and never was a "Canaanite Palestinian."

· He's alive and “seated at the right hand of the Father,” not “resting in peace.”

· Easter celebrates the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, not “Palestinian nationalism.”

· The story of Jesus is not “his [Palestinian] people’s story,” but the simple Gospel for the whole world as stated in John 3:16-17.

“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.”